Monday, July 18, 2005

Dan's Blog

Mondays are still Mondays, even when you work for yourself. It just has that stigma. That, and my work has picked up. Three assignments to do over next three weeks.

My old friend Dan Monroe, currently of Birmingham, Alabama, has started a blog, Story of the day. So far it has one entry (yesterday), which is called “Finding Dees.” He's got kind words for me, which I appreciate. I hope he'll post many more interesting things—he's got the chops for it. (See also his comment on my Next Door posting, July 12.)

On September 1, I will have known Dan exactly 24 years, a little more than half my life, though, of course, we’ve gone separate ways since the early ’80s, as he notes. How I remember that date so exactly is a matter of a written record, lore among friends, and my own propensity to remember that sort of thing, at least sometimes.

1 Comments:

I read your uber-skyscraper article on-line today, and it prompted me to go back and check out your blog, which I do from time to time.

For the sake of argument, I'm going to take the other side of the Mondays are Still Mondays perspective.

For me, self-employment is the ultimate antidote to the Sunday Night Blues and all associated illnesses. The day I bailed on the conventional nine-to-five workforce was my final taste of that queasy feeling that comes from impending work doom (or at least the stark reality that the weekend was fading and the following morning I would need to suck it up and head in to the office). Summer Sundays were especially brutal.

Now this is not to say self-employment is the ultimate lifestyle. I've generated my share of stomach acid and bile looking for gigs. And there are plenty of advantages to working for others. Direct deposit comes to mind. Getting paid while on vacation - what a concept!

But Monday Mornings? Score one for the self-employed. To me, that's one of the highlights of the week. Peer into my routine and twisted logic.

I drive my lovely wife to the EL, dump her off with a peck, and immediately look for a coffee shop. I prefer the underdog independent cafes, but hey, I'm not beyond donating to the Seattle-based behemoth. Then, I like to find a copy of David Radler's Rag (parting with two quarters far too steep a price). While breezing through the paper - that doesn't take long - I simply watch folks stream off to the office. Few things are so enjoyable, or so self-affirming. Check it out.

All the commuters have their game face on. Angry Biffs and Trixies speed to work in their SUVs and play chicken with pedestrians and each other. And the general sense of gloom - downright misery - seems to be pervasive.

Meanwhile, I sit back and think that it's now almost ten years where I've been cheating the system and carving out a little living for myself on my own. Sure, I still need to eat s#%t sometimes - plenty of it. But it's usually on my terms.

Anyway, while your self-employment lifestyle persists, peer through my glasses and see if Mondays are still Mondays. That said, I hope all is well with you and yours. We should catch up. And I look forward to getting paid to write for you sometime soon.